Valtteri Bottas says "a proper' opening day of running in Bahrain went a long way towards putting Alfa Romeo back on track after its Barcelona testing woes.
Alfa's pre-season preparations were disrupted by a multitude of issues in Spain two weeks ago, with the Swiss outfit racking up the second worst mileage at the Circuit de Catalunya behind Haas.
But on Thursday, Bottas and team mate Guanyu Zhou put an aggregate 120 laps on the board - the third-highest lap tally for the day - and they did it with only minor issues to report.
"All the issues we had in Barcelona seem like they are now behind us," said Bottas. "So that's positive.
"We finally managed to do some set-up work, and actually finding out how the car responds and what it needs and how it behaves. And it was nice to feel and to see the progress throughout the day.
"I could see some nervous people in the morning hoping that everything goes smoothly and now I can see quite a few happy faces."
Alfa Romeo's 2022 car experienced in Barcelona the "porpoising" phenomenon that was widespread among almost all teams in Spain. But at Sakhir, the Hinwil squad appeared to have eliminated the problem completely.
"Today, we had no issues," commented Bottas. "I'm pretty sure the whole grid is probably running the cars with a compromised set-up.
"But we are in a place now where it's not an issue at all for comfort or for reliability. So that was quite positive."
Zhou echoed the Finn's comments, and hailed Alfa's drama-free day as an opportunity to finally put some crucial mileage under his belt.
"Every time you step into the car you always feel more confident," explained the Chinese driver.
"Today was the first time I did a decent long run so I was still having some stuff I have to learn.
"It’s good to trial these kinds of conditions, short runs, long runs. Putting everything together in qualifying in F1 is definitely the key.
"Of course, I still need some decent mileage to have a final configuration, with the set-up I prefer on my side."
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